In a satirical song-and-dance number commenting on a relationship
between a Jewish grocer and a spinster landlady in the new revival of
Kander and Ebb’s Cabaret that recently had its Canadian
Premiere at Toronto’s Princess of Wales Theatre, the Emcee dances with
his girlfriend. He, in a white suit, and she, in a lovely printed
dress, dance a soft shoe, while the Emcee sings about his forbidden
relationship with this girl of his – who happens to be a gorilla, by the
way.

It’s funny and it’s charming. But when the Emcee, with a sinister
grin on his face, looks deadpan at the audience and utters the most
famous and the most penetrating punchline of the show, the audience
doesn’t utter a single laugh, but sits stunned in realization of their
honest mistake.

That particular song - "If You Could See Her Through My
Eyes" – is the perfect microcosm of this new revival directed by
Britain’s wunderkind stage director, Sam Mendes (currently receiving
critical acclaim for his film debut with Dreamworks’ American Beauty).
It is a carefully crafted revival that thoroughly entertains and makes
all the realities of a Weimar-era Berlin seem oblivious under the
audience’s noses. The unabashed display of sexuality and heroin chic
onstage at the fictional Kit Kat Klub seems vulgar, but it is this
accurate depiction of the late 1920’s night clubs of a Berlin on the eve
of the Third Reich that proves most effective in shocking – and also
entertaining – the generally conservative Toronto audiences. It makes
this story about two doomed relationships set against a pivotal
historical backdrop all the more absorbing, all the more gripping, and
all the more provocative.

Cabaret is best known as the Academy Award-winning 1972 film
directed by Bob Fosse, which starred Liza Minnelli as the cabaret singer
Sally Bowles, and Joel Grey as the Kit Kat Klub Emcee, who repeated his
Broadway triumph. The film is arguably the best movie musical, but is
actually quite different from the stage version. For one, the film
eliminates the romantic subplot between the landlady and the Jewish
grocer, and replaces that with a lesser known subplot from Christopher
Isherwood’s Berlin Stories, on which Cabaret is based, between a
rich Jewish girl and a repressed Jewish student.

Another major difference is the overall mood and direction of the
film, which follows the manner in which Harold Prince directed the
original Broadway production of the show (subsequent productions used
the original blueprint). In the film and the previous stage
productions, the Kit Kat Klub and its characters are all polished. The
Kit Kat girls are plump and jovial, Sally Bowles is a tad too optimistic
despite the political and personal turmoil, and The Emcee, clean-cut in
his black tux and painted face, remains emotionally distant throughout,
without much of a progression in character. The title song is an upbeat
anthem, swastikas are prevalent, and societal outcomes are hinted at the
end, although not directly addressed.

In the new revival, Sam Mendes holds back from marching out the
swastikas, and successfully keeps the audience somewhat unaware, or
complacent, of future implications without much use of the controversial
logo, keeping the audience seduced with the Kit Kat Klub’s lewd and
raunchy entertainment. The audience becomes the people of Berlin,
emotionally fast asleep, revelling in their obsession with American
culture, passing off any apparent warning or serious consideration of
the Nazis with a "Who cares?" attitude.

The Emcee (played here by a suave and charismatic Norbert Leo Butz),
with glittery nipples and suspenders around his crotch, is reminiscent
of the sexually-charged character of Alex in Stanley Kubrick’s film
"A Clockwork Orange." Where Joel Grey’s Emcee was a naughty,
German expressionist marionette, making suggestively sexual comments and
going as far as slapping a woman’s ass, The Emcee of this new production
is a crotch-grabbing, breast-grabbing pansexual, making passes at both
sexes onstage and off. And where Joel Grey’s Emcee remained as a
constant throughout, the Emcee’s character is allowed to progress – or
transform – in this production.

Here, Sally Bowles (played here by a diminutive, yet strong-voiced,
Joely Fisher of TV’s "Ellen" fame), is depicted as a wasted, cocaine
sniffing, naïve young woman, and an even more tragic figure.
Instead of strutting onstage emanating optimism like Minnelli on film,
Fisher makes her entrance by stumbling her way to the front of the stage
a nervous wreck, starting off the title song timidly, with her eyes
scanning the audience. With her voice cracking, volume increasing, and
her hands clutching the microphone, she sings "Life is a cabaret
old chum/Only a cabaret old chum/And I love a cabaret" with angst
and cynicism, smashing the microphone stand to the stage.

The Kit Kat Klub boys and girls here are scantily clad, with tattoos,
bruises, track markings, and expressionless faces, dancing with poor
timing and precision (done here intentionally to make this environmental
staging more realistic). The girls here look more like prostitutes than
the respectable plump Bavarian women in bowler hats and unripped
stockings as seen in the film or earlier stage versions.

What remain unchanged and similar to the film and the original stage
production are the plot and several of the songs, although the Joe
Masteroff book has been shortened, and songs from the film ("Maybe
This Time" and "Money") have been added. The clever,
witty, and bittersweet Kander and Ebb score sounds its best here with
the new Michael Gibson orchestrations, and the concept of the songs
acting as sideline commentaries or complements to the plot is even more
effective, especially with the poignant "Married."

Alma Cuervo as Fraulein Schneider, the Jewish landlady, and Hal
Robinson as Herr Schultz, the Jewish grocer, give heartbreaking
performances, while Rick Holmes is serviceable as Clifford Bradshaw, the
American writer who has a torrid relationship with Sally Bowles, and
Jeanine Morick as Fraulein Kost, the prostitute, is superb.

CABARET

Music and lyrics by John Kander and Fred Ebb. Book by Joe
Masteroff; based on the play I Am A Camera by John Van Druten and
stories by Christopher Isherwood. Directed by Sam Mendes; co-directed
choreographed by Rob Marshall. Scenic design by Robert Brill; costumes
by William Ivey Long; lighting by Peggy Eisenhauer and Mike Baldassari;
music director, Keith Thompson; musical supervisor, Patrick Vaccariello;
orchestrations, Michael Gibson. The Toronto engagement of the Roundabout
Theatre Company production presented by David and Ed Mirvish and Pace
Theatrical Group/SFX Entertainment in association with Eric and Scott
Nederlander & Jujamcyn Productions. At the Princess of Wales
Theatre, 300 King Street West, Toronto.